I often get asked how I made my fortune. It is an honest question non-wealthy people pose, and it doesn’t bother me at all to explain the path I took from rags to riches.
I left home at eighteen with seven cents in my pocket and the clothes on my back. And over the next five decades, through hard work and guile, I managed to amass more money than I can count. Some day I will write a book detailing how I did it but for now, I will share one little secret.
You might think a man of my elevated status would never need to go to a grocery store but Warren Buffett still steers his own car through the drivethrough at McDonald’s so it’s important not to lose the common touch. Another thing about the elites I run with is, far from being tightwads, we like to spend, sometimes with wild abandon.
In the store today, I saw a sign advertising three bags of potato chips for four dollars. That seemed like a bargain, judging by the size of the sign announcing the deal, but here’s your first wealth tip: It is no bargain at all if all you want is one bag of chips, which is all I wanted (and one more than my doctor wants me to have). So, I ignored the bargain and bought only one bag. It cost me $1.34. If I had taken advantage of the special sale, each of the three bags would have cost me $1.333333333 (to infinity).
So, yeah, call me reckless, but my plan is to spend every red cent – literally, in this case, one cent at a time – before I die. As you can see, with my sometimes wild abandon ways, I am well on my way to achieving my goal.
©2019 Jim Hagarty
